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Baby Boomers who were born in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s have truly experienced it all. I feel just as connected to my grandchildren as I did my grandparents, because I was a part of it all! Spanning so many decades allows you to easily relate to all age groups, making life so much more interesting. Personally, born in December of 1948, I find it a spectacular year to have made an appearance. Think of the exciting world changes alone! It’s hard to imagine how the next 64 years could bring about as many changes as I’ve seen in my first nearly 64 years. Technologically speaking, I can’t begin to fathom how we can advance at that same rate of speed.

I particularly enjoy the elderly, and when I say elderly, I mean older than me; like people in their late 70’s and 80’s. It’s too bad that seniors in this age group are not held in more respect, based on their life experience alone. Yes, maybe they are slow and maybe don’t communicate in sequential order, but if you take the time to listen, they are a wealth of fun and valuable information. The oldsters are a cracker-jack box of nostalgia!

Though senior life has its downside, the nostalgic value is a definite upside. When we can no longer be as physically active as in our youth, we can at least enjoy sitting around a camp fire remembering when. Reminiscing may not be as exciting as the actual experiences, but it’s a good pacifier. My advice to the younger generation is to create the memories. It would be pretty sad sitting around the fire without any tales of yesteryear! Methinks the current generation whose entertainment is solely centered around computer games, smart phones and music players, will be in short supply of nostalgia when they’ve reached their golden years. Thinking back on when you reached the final level of your favorite video game can hardly compete with the time you were brave enough to finally climb that dreaded hill on your dirt bike, but then toppled over just as you reached the top. I’m just saying…………..

It’s fascinating how memory loss is such an annoyance to the boomers, but yet you can remember the exact circumstances around pivotal moments in history. Doesn’t everyone remember exactly where they were and what they were doing and the exact emotions they were experiencing when JFK was assassinated? I use this as an example because my personal experience was particularly unusual, in my mind anyway. I was a freshman in high school sitting in a business class taught by a very pregnant teacher. The assassination was announced over the loud speaker. The expected shock was clearly visible on the faces of the students, yet this instructor displayed no reaction. Indeed when the announcement was over, she immediately picked up where she left off without remarking and no words of consolation for the students. This sticks in my mind, but yet I can’t remember why I got up and walked to another room, apparently looking for something, but what?

It’s all good. At least what we can remember will provide us with warm and fuzzy feelings. Who cares what we don’t remember. It reminds me of what my best friend once told me. If you forgot something you read or watched on TV or seen in the movies, not a problem; it’s all new again. That makes me smile.

Long and Loud TV commercials are not luring me to buy the products. I know advertising is the way of the world now-a-days, but please, can we give the consumer a break? Thank God for DVR’s, and I suppose because of them, advertisers have to work even harder to get their ads out and make them effective enough to promote buying. We do at least have the option to record programming.

If this is beginning to sound like a rant, that’s probably because it is. How annoying are commercials in general? The interruption factor alone is enough to frustrate the be-jesus out of you. It’s like constantly having someone interrupt a conversation you’re having with someone else. How rude is that? At least you can tell the interrupting person to shut the hell up. What are you going to do with the TV? Shoot a bullet through the screen comes to mind, but then that, and just shutting it off, would be like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Of course as already mentioned we have the option of recording. But certain things you just want to watch live; sporting events and news programming comes to mind as a couple of examples.

It’s just as rude to rant like a maniac without offering a solution/suggestion. Yes. I have a couple. One of course is to just make the commercials shorter. This would force advertisers to come up with clever advertising with shorter blurbs; it would probably even be more effective. Another option is to just have one intermission in the middle of the programming, for an actual 10 minutes vs. an exaggerated 10. Or, have 5 minutes of commercial at the beginning and end of the program. Not sure how that would work considering there is already commercials in between programs, but they could make them longer, and people can just take a bathroom break or raid the kitchen break during that time. Who knows, if the ads were actually clever or funny, maybe people would actually want to watch them, especially if they were spaced out per my suggestions.

That brings to mind another irritation with commercials. Why the heck are they so loud? It’s like shouting at your kids to get them to listen to you. Guess what? Just like with your kids, it has the opposite effect. They just turn you off! It turn, you turn down the volume and ignore the commercial. So much for good advertising. I don’t know who’s responsible, the advertisers or the TV stations when it comes to pumping up the volume, but I’d sure like to know who to complain to.

Maybe I should be worrying about how to get gas prices down, or global warming or something equally altruistic. Thing is, I wouldn’t have anymore control over those even more important issues, than I do over TV commercials. Instead, I rant. Maybe ranting is just as annoying as long and loud TV commercials and not so hot on the listeners. But it’s great therapy for the one ranting. We’re told not to hold in the anger. I take that kind of advice seriously. Seriously!

If a good laugh comes with the craziness, then all is not in vain. At least this year Auggie Doggie kept his dog-gone paws off the dining room table! He even had a partner in crime this year, a new edition to the family. That would be Toby, our little eight and half month old Pomeranian/Min-Pin pup. In case you need to catch up, do take a peek at saga one: Thanksgiving Day Come and Gone Toby is quite the little character in his own right and could no doubt stir up some trouble if he chose to; however, he decided to follow the lead of his big brother who did nothing more serious than a little begging for turkey. But then again, nobody brought chocolate cream pie this year either. So could be he had no incentive to act up. Apparently he has no interest in the old stand-by pumpkin and apple pie. Hey, no sweat off our noses Auggie Doggie; more for us! Toby by the way has a saga of his own. In case you want to learn how he became one of the clan, take a look-see here: TobyNo

So you ask; how did I manage to keep it together this year and actually manage to have time to talk to the family? Well first, as I mentioned earlier, I decided I needed a bit of an attitude adjustment. It dawned on me that there isn’t anything I could do about the family and their attitudes; I could only change mine. I just chilled out, period. Once I came to this glorious realization, seems the universe decided to cooperate, as did everyone else around me, including the bird. I slapped the stuffing into that puppy (no not Toby), and got it into the oven like a pro, no fuss, no muss.

I also found out you can reuse that piece of plastic, which binds the bird’s legs together, and stuff its legs back into it to keep the stuffing from falling out. That in itself made my day! Makes me wonder how I managed to get nearly 64 years old without realizing I could cook the bird with that plastic piece attached. Sometimes it pays to read the directions. I guess it’s also true that you learn something new every day.

See what I mean about the universe cooperating? Once I gave in/up, things just started falling into place. Next, once the bird was in the oven, I began preparing the veggies and candied yams right after I closed the oven door on the bird. Instead of waiting until later when the turkey was close to being done, I saved myself the hassle of scurrying around the kitchen, bumping butts with the daughters, trying to get it all on the table while the turkey was still hot. Then, all that needed to be done was to heat the rest of the meal. Bam, snap, nothing to it!

Did you know that a metal whisk can change your life? Yep, threw away the whisk that was falling apart and got a nice new metal one with no rubbery stuff to fall off into the gravy. So there were no snide remarks from daughter number one about my gravy making skills. I also did not hear one word about Rachel Rae’s fabulous recipe. We all just settled for gravy without rubber particles floating around in it.

Okay, I didn’t make a COMPLETE attitude change. I did slip up once which made for at least one funny incident in the kitchen…ice cubes in the mashed potatoes. I told daughter number two that she had to mash the potatoes. Then I proceeded to stand over her and tell her how to do it. I couldn’t help myself; she wanted to put in the milk before the butter! Who does that? The butter has to melt before you poor in the cold milk, right?

Remembering my resolve, I took my glass of champagne and wandered into the living room to talk to my granddaughters. Suddenly I hear the words “ice cubes and “mashed potatoes” linked together coming from the mouth of daughter number one. What? Were they going to put ice cubes in the mashed potatoes? I made a dash for the kitchen as both daughters began to roar with laughter. They must get their sense of humor from their mother; how could I be angry.

So then, Thanksgiving at our House – The Next Saga may be the last in the series of Thanksgiving fiasco stories. If I maintain the new attitude change and add a few more organizational changes, maybe there will be nothing of interest to write about? Oh say it’s not so…I do so love laughing and reflecting on the day over my pie and tea on the Friday morning after. Mind you, it is only funny the NEXT day.